The Office

photo by allys.a/Creative Commons

Spent yesterday deconstructing – OH!  I mean organizing – Tom’s office.

Oh…my…Lord…

There are at least 50 piles of 3M abrasive/adhesive literature in my living room mocking me this morning.  I’d say a good 200 – 250 pounds or so.  And I oughta know, since I  was busting open boxes and hauling it in here all day yesterday.

There is also a really big plastic bag of hunting clothes, two rifles, binoculars, a  camo ball cap, a blaze orange ball cap, an economy-size bottle de-scenting soap,  misc bullets and shotgun shells, 2 boxes of fishing line, hunting boots, at least a dozen arrows, one of those thingies that you can put feathers on arrows with, paper targets and on and on ad infinitum…sitting at the top of the stairs waiting for some manly man to come along and get a clue.

Recycled 30 pounds (probably more) of hunting and fishing magazines I found tucked back in the closet in ratty old Cabela’s bags.

Tom came out of his now-decluttered office and walked through the living room last night…which looks like 3M threw up in it…smiling and clucking about what a fine job I’m doing.  He mentioned that he thinks there might be another few boxes of literature in the garage…somewhere.

When he lost his job last year, I decided that the care and cleaning of Tom’s office wasn’t my responsibility anymore.   Seeing as how he was no longer working, he would have time to clean it up himself.

It occurred to me that since he’s now retired – we could job share – you know – the housework.

Hilarious.

Up until then, Tom and I had sighed and accepted our old extinct dinosaur of a marriage where he earned a salary and I took care of the house and finances. Understand…I wasn’t trained for this in the 70’s when we were all burning our bras and reading The Feminine Mystique.  I don’t know any other women my age who live like this.  I can hardly write it without wishing for one of those little black rectangles to cover my eyes so you won’t know who I am.

It…this old marriage we have…has evolved into me picking up after Tom.  I’m the Picker Upper.  He’s the Layer Downer.  (don’t ask him about this…he will lie and say it’s the other way around).  I fought being the Picker Upper for a long, LONG time by bitching and sniping at him at every opportunity.  I tried ignoring his stuff…and him.  This did NOT work.  It was sorta like putting a cork in a bottle of soda and giving it a good shake.  It was just a matter of time before I popped that cork.  It took YEARS, but I finally had to admit that here was a battle I could not win.  I had to either leave the stuff where he left it, divorce him, kill him, or pick up his crap.

Tough choice.

Especially because on those rare occasions when he thinks he’s picking up after himself?  Like when he pretends his dirty underwear is a basketball and the hamper is the hoop?  Mostly he misses that easy lay-up (which makes me seriously question all those stories about what a smoking hot high school basketball stud he was).  Then?  He smiles.  Shrugs his shoulders and walks out of the room whistling.  Dirty underwear…on the floor…right next to the hamper.  This, my friends, enrages me in a way that makes me want to scream profanities and stomp my foot through the floor like Rumplestiltskin.

Which is not a good look on me.

There were two areas in particular…hunting crap and tools…left laying around the house at random…that I had pretty much taken to pitching into his office and closing the door.

This was my “Norma Rae” act of defiance to the unfair job I’ve been forced to endure.

Tom never really noticed.

But it has all come back to bite me in the butt bigtime.

Today…I’ll finish organizing the deconstruction…tuck everything neatly away so Tom can find it when he needs it (except the &^%$# hunting stuff…that’s going into the great abyss in the basement we call “Tom’s side”).

So he can make some money.

And I can buy me some bedroom furniture.

Party on.

Crapaphoria

photo by John Gullo/Creative Commons

There’s something to be said for having all your crap all together all in one place and all at the same time.

Gives such personal meaning to the phrase “getting your crap together.”

I finally have my crap together.

I also have Tom’s crap together.  Which he should be pretty grateful for, if you ask me.

All here.  In the new house.  Me and Tom and all our crap.

Such controversy over whose crap is good and whose isn’t.  That’s a story for a later time.

And…is it at all possible that I could use the word crap any more often and with any less finesse in this my first piece of writing in twelve hundred years?

I don’t think so.

Here’s the good (read:  UNBELIEVABLY GREAT…ranking right up there with the birth of healthy babies #1 and #2) news:

608 5^th St. Lowden, IA is Under New Management.

No more fretting about clogged gutters and windstorms or torrential downpours or dorky little vandal wannabes who throw rocks through bay windows or utility companies who turn off your gas in early winter without actually contacting you (if you don’t count the teeny tiny note they attached to the natural gas line mentioning that you might like to call them if you want your gas turned back on.  This was not for lack of payment.  It was for Nobody Knows Why.).

No more paying $80 a month for truly crappy lawn mowing.

No more crazy craigslist emails telling me I was “donb” for listing the house at our price.

No more paying Alliant Energy and City of Lowden utilities.

No more Cedar County property taxes for a place sitting empty.

No more homeowner’s insurance on a second home that I still love but don’t live in.

Just a basement in Waukee full of Where Did All THIS New-Old Crap Come From?

_____

So, I’m thinking about…actually enjoying thinking about…landscaping and room painting in Waukee…w/out my recently retired disclaimer that I can commit to no new thing…because God-only-knows-when-something terrible/awful/horrible/expensive-is-going-to-happen-to-the-Lowden-house which will guarantee that we won’t be able to afford/fix/buy anything for the rest of our lives.

I am finally moving on and moving in.

AND…for the record:

Cherie Bell is officially tipping her For Sale By Owner hat with a flourish.  Leaving behind the murky and marvelous land of real estate selling on a shoestring…

I’m never moving again.

I will be that crazy old woman with the orange hair and 4” gray roots, dragged from her home in a 37-year-old stained pink nightgown kicking and screaming about the unflattering lighting and pukey wall color in nursing homes.

I’m settled.

Really.  Truly.

All my crap is here.

I’m here.

All Tom’s crap is here.

He’s here.

The washer works.

I have TV.

Windows that need washing and walls that need new paint with real color.

A finite number…of walls and windows…unlike the infinite ones we lately had.

Better.

Way, WAY better.

And just think…it only took 16 months.

Reinvention is a slow process.

PS  That photo is not my basement.

PPS  Call before stopping by.

Take It or Leave It

Just a second or two to write.

I’m winning the paperwork wars – or at least a major battle or two.  Set up the new filing system I should have done right after we bought the farm.   Huge deal for me and Tom and I’m proud of myself for finally facing the monster and sticking him in yellow and red accordion files (plus brown AND blue).

Just wanting to connect this morning.  To feel the love.  Nothing like sifting through a big pile of expired 2-for-1 dining out coupons to make you feel like a lonely loser.

Trying to pump myself up for the final move from Lowden next weekend…and fight the ultimate Declutter vs. Bring-It-to-Waukee battle of my life.  This is Tom’s junk I’m talking about, of course.  My junk is priceless.

His basement.

His garage.

The attic is mine.  Baby clothes and Hug-a-Bunch dolls in big plastic containers and dusty garbage bags.  The frame of an old couch that was there when we moved in.  Two cribs from back when Jenny and Lorie were babies. 

Now, Jenny and Lorie have their own babies.

I keep telling Tom that if we haven’t used it in a year and a half, then we don’t need it.  Of course, that’s not entirely true (when it comes to my stuff).  And I guess we do still want our table saw and Tom’s reloading bench and that enormous horizontal file cabinet (see paragraph #1).

I’m thinking this morning about how our lives are shaped as much by what we leave behind as what we bring along.

More and more I feel like I need to travel light.  I think it’s the key to enjoying being a middle-ager.  But the more I try to fling the extraneous, the more I butt up against the hard fact that…in order to do that…I have to be willing to change myself…to let go…not only of physical stuff, but my attitudes and ways of looking at things. 

Like my old problem solving strategies…the ones which aren’t working as well for my new life as a 50-something. 

 When I was younger, there was just so much more energy to throw at challenges.  Something wrong?  Work harder!  Work longer!

Now, there’s less drive, less energy, less in reserve.  So, now maybe it’s more about living simpler and working smarter.  More about being disciplined and consistent over time.  Less about furious bursts of energy in the moment. 

More doing your homework every day and less cramming for finals.

Which is a  lesson I started learning  when I became a mom and finally got it:  The key to progress is consistency.   Then, I got more practice when I went back to college in my 40’s.

Still learning it.   (Learning is a good thing.)

Stuff  (commitments, projects, crises) can slow us down to a turtle’s pace.   Just the mere lugging it around…emotional baggage, spiritual shortcomings AND material things…can eat up all our time…

Lots to do today and for a few days to come.

Don’t abandon me if I’m incommunicado for a bit, because I’m not abandoning you. 

 I just have all this crap to move and this old house to sell….

Love you guys.